


Hard Knocks

by thegreatmachine17



Category: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018)
Genre: And the description makes it sound vaguely smutty, But it's actually neither of those, F/M, Inspired by something both myself and my five foot nothing sister have done, The title makes it sound vaguely sad, set sometime during season 3
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-20
Updated: 2020-07-20
Packaged: 2021-03-04 18:27:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,049
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25410853
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thegreatmachine17/pseuds/thegreatmachine17
Summary: Entrapta tells Hordak about some of her scars. Including one from an unexpected source.
Relationships: Entrapta/Hordak (She-Ra)
Comments: 6
Kudos: 140





	Hard Knocks

Hordak tried not to look too closely at his arms as the last piece of the armor was lifted away. He’d never liked the feeling that followed taking his armor off. How heavy and useless his limbs felt and the comparatively cold air of the lab against skin that had previously been insulated and protected. With how well Entraptas armor worked, it made having to get out of it that much worse. Unfortunately they’d had little choice. Entrapa’s latest tests on his horde robots had taken place in the sandy areas just outside of the Fright Zone, and the dust it had kicked up had found its way under the plating and into the seams and mechanisms of the armor. 

The last thing he needed on his list of problems was several dozen tiny abrasions and malfunctioning armor. 

So now he and Entrapta stood next to each other, with the armor disassembled in front of them on one of his work benches. They’d been cleaning it for nearly an hour. His arms had started aching in the first few minutes. 

He probably should have said something, or let Entrapta finish the rest. She’d even offered. But he would have to clean it on his own at some point so he’d insisted on helping, and for the most part he’d managed just fine.

At least until his hand slipped and fell across the edge of some of the outer plating.

Hordak glared at the line of fresh blood across his palm and forced himself not to wince at the sudden sting of pain. Hopefully Entrapta wouldn’t notice and he could make an excuse to leave and wrap it up.

“Is that blood?”

So much for that plan. 

“Yes. I can take care of it myself. You don’t have to stop.”

Entrapta dropped the tiny brush she was holding and moved closer, turning his hand with one strand of hair to examine the wound, and reaching under the bench for the first aid kit with another. “Oh I don’t mind helping. I’m sure it’s a pain trying to tie bandages with one hand.”

It was. Especially when neither hand wanted to work properly to begin with. But there was no way he was admitting that to her.

“Fine. Just be quick about it.”

To her credit, she was more than efficient. Her hair moved easily from one step to another, one strand cleaning the wound even as another strand selected a gauze pad and two more unwound the bandages. The whole process took about two Etherian minutes.

Hordak flexed his fingers and turned the hand over, running the fingers of his uninjured hand over the almost perfectly smooth knot. “You’ve had a lot of practice at this, haven’t you?”

Entrapa shrugged. “When things go wrong with robots, they can go very wrong. I got the hang of it pretty quickly. Some of the scars are pretty intense though.”

That made him pause. Between the gloves, welding mask, fire resistant overalls and metal capped shoes, she seemed well protected. It had never occurred to him that, despite her somewhat haphazard methods, she might have acquired any scars. “It seems none of them impede your ability to work.”

“I mean, they can be really itchy sometimes. And I broke my leg a few years ago and it’s never liked sudden temperature changes since.” She rolled up a pant leg to reveal a large patch of pale scar tissue on her shin. “I got this one when my pant leg caught on fire. It’s horribly distracting when it gets itchy. Oh and this long one on my shoulder is from a test I was running with a chef robot. I probably should have given it a different knife to practice with, but what fun is that? Besides it would have messed up the calibrations for how much force and what angles it needed to use.”

She paused and a grin crossed her face. “Oh, that reminds me!”

She untucked her white shirt, revealing a third mark, this one a blotchy bruise across her hip. It looked recent. “Where do you think I got this one? I’ll give you three guesses.”

Hordak frowned, picked up a sand filled actuator and a can of compressed air, and tried to ignore the heat rising to his face and ears. “Um… one of the robotic limbs malfunctioned while you were working on it?”

‘Nope!”

“During the weapons test?”

“Wrong again!”

“What about… was it Emily’s doing?” The robot would never purposely hurt entrapta, but it was clumsy.

“None of the above!”

Hordak set aside the actuator and turned his full attention back to her, curious despite himself. “What is it from then?”

“I walked into a door knob!”

He stared down at her, searching desperately for something to say. Entrapta continued talking.

“Now I know what you’re thinking, but let me tell you, when you’re barely 5 feet tall those things can be a nightmare. They sit at just the right height that…”

“Entrapta.”

“... Don’t see them in time they’ll…”

“Entrapta!”

“What?”

“The Fright Zone doors are automated.”

“Oh I know. But some of the ones on the lower levels still have knobs on them. I found it surprising too.” Her hair rustled, and suddenly there was a shiny round object at the end of each ponytail. “Which is why I kept some!”

Hordak stared at the door knobs. At the undeniable proof that somewhere in the Fright Zone there were doors that could be opened without checking to see who was approaching them first, or wouldn’t respond correctly to an emergency. It was a huge flaw in both security and safety. 

He pulled up a map of the Fright Zone on a data pad and handed it to her. “Mark any doors that have yet to be automated on this. They will be dealt with accordingly.”

Entrapta tossed aside the door knobs and looped her hair around the pad instead. “You don’t have to tell me twice!”

He hadn’t been intending on asking her a second time, but he didn’t bother bringing that up. Instead he turned his attention back to the actuator and ignored the clattering as Emily chased after the wayward door knobs.

He trusted Entrapta to clean up after whatever mess the robot made.


End file.
